Superannuitants to form branch

Press, 21 April 1986, Page 5

Superannuitants to form branch

About 120 Christchurch superannuitants decided yesterday to form a Christchurch branch of the National Superannuitants’ Federation. The federation was formed in Auckland 11 months ago to protest against the surcharge on income and now has 18,000 members. The chairman of the committee which organised the Christchurch meeting, Mr Tom Came, said he had hoped for a bigger attendance. He had predicted that about 500 people would attend.

The federation’s national secretary, Mr Bob Hubbard, told the superannuitants that the surcharge was completely unfair. Superannuitants can earn up to $7OOO a year if they are single or

$12,000 for a married couple before they lose 25c of their benefit for every dollar earned.

Mr Hubbard said that an ordinary person earning $25,000 this year would pay 31c in the dollar as tax. A superannuitant earning the same amount would pay 56c in the dollar. Thirty-one cents of this would be the normal tax, and 25c would be the surcharge.

“The citizens in a country should pay the same tax rate for the same salary or income received,” Mr Hubbard said. “At present we have this tremendous discrimination against a section of the community — and not a highly paid section of the community.” Mr Hubbard said he

had spoken to several Labour members of Parliament who agreed that the system was unfair.

“I believe that we have made the Government of New Zealand — the members of both sides of the House — aware of the problem, and aware of the injustice,” he said.

While the national federation could attack the problem on a national level, ultimately it was up to individual members to work for change. "The only way that you will ever remove the surtax, is by convincing your member of Parliament that it is a good thing to remove that surtax, or if he or she does not remove it, you might be forced to remove him,” he said.